Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, and so on. Such networks, which are usually multiple access networks, support communications for multiple users by sharing the available network resources. One example of such a network is the UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN). The UTRAN is the radio access network (RAN) defined as a part of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), a third generation (3G) mobile phone technology supported by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).
In a UTRAN, among other wireless access networks, quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) is a frequently utilized modulation technique in which a 2-bit symbol is encoded by controlling the phase of two carrier waves, referred to as an in-phase (I) carrier and a quadrature (Q) carrier. One consideration in decoding received QPSK signals is an estimation of the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the received transmission. The SNR estimate additionally may be used for other purposes, such as power control of the transmission. While many SNR estimation techniques are known in the art, there remains a desire in the art to improve the performance of an SNR estimation algorithm, as well as to simplify the computational complexity of such an algorithm.
Thus, as the demand for mobile broadband access continues to increase, research and development continue to advance wireless technologies not only to meet the growing demand for mobile broadband access, but to advance and enhance the user experience with mobile communications.